Colonel Green (Edward H.r. Green) Coin Collection Inventory

This sounds quite intriguing, old numismatic literature and auction catalogs have been bringing big money the past few years. As an example of the top end market, the Stack Family Numismatic Library was recently auctioned in two parts. The hammer total from the two auctions was a little bit over $1 million- books and catalogs, no coins... The firm that promoted the auction specifically sells and auctions numismatic literature, Kolbe and Fanning Numismatic Booksellers.

Addendum with regard to the Stack's Collection auction mentioned by biokemist: Stack's official written record of their Green collection holdings and disposition, including an inventory and various correspondence including that involving King Farouk, auctioned for $70,000.

Keep that in mind.

What an amazing piece of numismatic heritage. I am left speechless (wordless)!

I'm glad, but not surprised, to know that you already understand the importance of the task. Would that I was geographically closer, and able to assist.

I will make additional postings as time and details permit.

The wealth of interesting material is amazing. I have identified several different types of materials thus far.

Catalogs - If I can believe the labels - a complete set of the auction catalogs from Stacks back to the 1930s. Many catalogs from other auctions dating back to the 1800s.

News Letters - Bowers and Ruddy Special Coin letter 1971-1981 complete? Boxes of other communication.

Stampless covers - folded letters from 1850s - at least 50 so far

Stamped covers - folded letters with stamps on the outside just a few

Envelopes - numerous types including Sea mail and diplomatic 1000's

Stock Certificates with stamps from the early 1900s (a box full)

Old Checks many cancelled and 2 bound books of blank Checks from a defunct Bank

Three corporate seals all defunct corporations

A box of documents relating to the 1901 seizure of a Whaling Vessel by the Russians - Trial text in French with depositions in English. A diary transcript is also included in English from one of the crew.

Post Cards - picture and non-picture late 1800s - 1900s hundreds

Advertising Cards some illustrated (just a few so far)

Books - Mostly Colonial reference books specializing in Connecticut and NJ.

Stamps - several old stamp books US and Foreign - Boxes of loose stamps - some new US stamps (postal blocks) etc, etc.

Also a three volume (loose leaf binder) set of the appraisal of the Colonel Green Stamp collection.

Personal notebooks documenting the portion of the original collection sold by Stacks in 1993 and 2000. Mostly Connecticut coppers some very rare varieties. There is a results sheet for the 2000 sale indicating a payment by Stacks over $600,000 for the Connecticut coppers at that time. The heirs indicate the 1993 sale was larger and exceeded $1,000,000. For about 20 of the higher grade coins - the original owner George Perkins made aluminum foil impressions of his coins and put them in 2x2 holders with the Maris attributions on them. The time and effort put into the Connecticut coppers by Mr. Perkins is amazing. There are hundreds of pages of notes and correspondence written about Connecticut coppers.

The collector was George C. Perkins who was a collector of colonial coins - primarily Connecticut coppers. When his collection was sold by Stacks in 1993 it was one of the most complete collections of early Conn. varieties known at that time.

There are 15 raw Connecticut cents in the remaining collection. There are also 3 slabbed by PCGS - the best of the 3 slabbed coins is a 1787 Horned Bust in AU53. Some of the 15 appear to be UNKNOWN die pairings that George was working on at the time of his death.

I have not really begun to work on the coins yet.

Mr. Perkins was also an Attorney and he occupied offices that at one time were used by one of the firms that handled business for Col. Green. As far as I can determine, he was not a direct legal successor to that firm which is critical in this case. The Green material all came from the earlier law firm files. A great deal of the other correspondence may have as well - I simply do not know - no one does. I checked with the estate attorney about the "legality" of these materials. He was of the opinion that any violation of the law or of Attorney Client privilege was on the part of the original law firm which apparently ABANDONED the files instead of destroying them. He further indicated that if the law firms had been in direct succession - he would have already ordered the materials DESTROYED regardless of their value as collectibles. He cited a case with which he was involved. In that case, documents arising from an Attorney-Client relationship between his firm and Ted Williams (the Red Sox ball player) had to be DESTROYED instead of being sold. The files contained 100's of Ted Williams autographs!

But in this case, I am on very good ground since the bulk of the questionable documents were actually being thrown away by the estate heirs. I am a salvor of abandoned materials in this case.

Surprizing that some museum hasn't tried to make some type of offer.